Rafael Nadal has been Roger Federer’s nemesis for long. The two battled all over the places, but the Spanish sensation managed to find the solution to beat his rival most of the time. It’s well-known that the key of Rafa’s success against the Swiss sensation was his lefty forehand hammering Federer’s one-handed backhand that was struggling to deal with high balls.
Uncle Toni and Rafa’s forehand
Rafa’s historic coach is his uncle Toni. There was a legend going around that it was Toni to make Rafa playing with his left hand even if he was a righty. However, it was Rafa to confirm that that is not true during a recent video with Federer saying that playing with the left hand came just natural for him and not something that got planned.
During a recent interview with Eurosport, Uncle Toni commented:
“I figured that Rafael could play with a lot of intensity because this is how he loves the sport. I always wanted that Rafael to be able to hit forehand winners, but he played with a lot of a spin, maybe too much sometimes.
When we arrived on the ATP tour, Rafael was really young, he was 16 years old, and then he started to play with older players, with people who were stronger. Then Rafael started to hit the ball a little late, he started to play high above the net with extreme spin.
I didn’t like it too much that he played this way, but in the end I saw that it was a good way to win. His forehand is hit high above the net, but when the ball bounces, it keeps its speed, it accelerates.”
Play Tennis Like The Pros #3 – Rafael Nadal | Tennis Forehand Lesson
“Rafael moves his wrist a little faster and then the ball bounces, the ball has so much pace. On clay, he has seen that with his extreme top-spin forehands were putting opponents in a difficult position because every time he could hit the ball two or three times over the backhand of his opponents pushing them to hit it back at shoulder height.
Then it was easy for him to get a short ball and hit to the other side. Though, he knows that on hard court it is different. But despite inadvertently causing years of pain for Federer“, he added.
Rafael Nadal’s ranking and performance in 2020
Now ranked no.2, Rafael played his last match on the 29th of February when he defeated Taylor Fritz 6-3 6-2 in the final in Acapulco to win his 85th career title.
During this season Rafael has a 13-3 win-loss record. Nadal conquered 1 title in Acapulco.
Roger Federer’s ranking and performance in 2020
At the moment ranked no.4, Federer played his last match on the 30th of January when he capitulated to Novak Djokovic 7-61 6-4 6-3 in the semifinal of the Australian Open.
Roger Federer’s most significant result of the year was getting to the semi-finals at the Australian Open.
Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer played each other 40 times. The head to head is 24-16 for Nadal. The last time that they squared off, Roger Federer won 7-63 1-6 6-3 6-4 in the semifinal in London (Wimbledon) in July 2019.
Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer |
| Embed from Getty Images |
